A JAILED drug dealer who made over £750,000 as part of a cocaine ring has been ordered to pay back just £1.

Daniel Chisholm is currently serving a 12-year sentence for his involvement in a cocaine factory which had been set up at a flat.

The 51-year-old was put behind bars after a high-profile trial which saw former Premier League football star Michael Chopra give evidence at court.

Yesterday, Newcastle Crown Court was told during a Proceeds of Crime Act hearing that Chisholm's available assets, and therefore the amount Judge John Evans ordered him to pay back, is just £1.

Co-accused John Somerville, who was also jailed for his involvement, benefited by the same amount.

The assets he has available to pay back come to £16,094.

Ex-Sunderland striker Chopra became embroiled in the case after claiming a £50,000 bundle found in the footwell of a Jaguar being driven by Ronald Moon was money being used to pay off his gambling debts - not drugs cash.

Prosecutors said the cash was linked to a "cocaine factory" which had been set up in the Washington flat belonging to Joseph Lewins.

Lewins' flat, at Malvern Road, was used to process, package and distribute high-grade cocaine, and was kitted out with the necessary equipment to do so.

Prosecutors said the £50,000 was part-payment for a 68 per cent pure, two kilogram batch, seized at the flat by police, who had the gang under secret surveillance in the weeks before their arrest in 2010.

During the trial the gang said the allegations against them were "ridiculous" and tried to shift the blame onto the late Stuart Mottram, a man known in Sunderland as "Benny the Brick".

However, the claims were dismissed as an "absurd defence".

Chopra gave evidence for the defence, claiming the £50,000 in a black bin-bag in the car being driven by Moon was being used to pay off loan sharks.

The footballer, a former England under-21 international, told the court his family came under threat as he struggled to pay back cash he had blown through his £2million gambling addiction, which had started "taking over his life".